New Lifehacking Strategy: Reward with Food

I love procrastinating almost as much as I love eating. Recently, I devised a plan to combat my bad habit with my love of eating. So far I’m applying it to good procrastination, i.e. avoiding chores. Anyone who has recently seen the sea of paper surrounding my desk can attest to the fact that I am not generally a neat and tidy person.

The plan is simple: if I’ve been putting off a chore, like folding my laundry, I’ll force myself to get it done before I eat my next meal. That way, once I’ve started, I’ll have incentive to get it done as quickly as possible, preventing it from eating my real work time. This strategy also works great for cleaning up my kitchen after cooking. If the kitchen needs to be clean before eating, I’ll think about cleaning up as I go along, and once I’m done cooking I’ll move as quickly as possible so I can eat before my dinner is cold. No more stress watching the dishes pile up in the sink as I neglect them. I believe I could apply this to my real work as well – picking a coding task to work on or a phone call to be made, and delaying my Pavlovian treat until I’ve checked in the code or made the phone call.